Mariette, a prey to the most despairing thoughts, walked on and on mechanically, wholly unconscious of the route she was following, until she reached the Pont au Change. At the sight of the river she started suddenly like one awaking from a dream, and murmured, "It was my evil genius that brought me here."
In another moment she was leaning over the parapet gazing down eagerly into the swift flowing waters below. Gradually, as her eyes followed the course of the current, a sort of vertigo seized her. Unconsciously, too, she was slowly yielding to the fascination such a scene often exerts, and, with her head supported on her hands, she leaned farther and farther over the stream.
"I could find forgetfulness there," the poor child said to herself. "The river is a sure refuge from misery, from hunger, from sickness, or from a miserable old age, an old age like that of my poor godmother. My godmother? Why, without me, what would become of her?"
Just then Mariette felt some one seize her by the arm, at the same time exclaiming, in a frightened tone:
"Take care, my child, take care, or you will fall in the river."
The girl turned her haggard eyes upon the speaker, and saw a stout woman with a kind and honest face, who continued, almost affectionately:
"You are very imprudent to lean so far over the parapet, my child. I expected to see you fall over every minute."
"I was not noticing, madame — "
"But you ought to notice, child. Good Heavens! how pale you are! Do you feel sick?"
"No, only a little weak, madame. It is nothing. I shall soon be all right again."
"Lean on me. You are just recovering from a fit of illness, I judge."
"Yes, madame," replied Mariette, passing her hand across her forehead. "Will you tell me where I am, please?"
"Between the Pont Neuf and the Pont au Change, my dear. You are a stranger in Paris, perhaps."
"No, madame, but I had an attack of dizziness just now. It is passing off, and I see where I am now."
"Wouldn't you like me to accompany you to your home, child?" asked the stout woman, kindly. "You are trembling like a leaf. Here, take my arm."
"I thank you, madame, but it is not necessary. I live only a short distance from here."
"Just as you say, child, but I'll do it with pleasure if you wish. No? Very well, good luck to you, then."
And the obliging woman continued on her way.
Mariette, thus restored to consciousness, as it were, realised the terrible misfortune that had befallen her all the more keenly, and to this consciousness was now added the fear of being cruelly reproached by her godmother just at a time when she was so sorely in need of consolation, or at least of the quiet and solitude that one craves after such a terrible shock.
Desiring to evade the bitter reproaches this long absence was almost sure to bring down upon her devoted head, and remembering the desire her godmother had expressed that morning, Mariette hoped to gain forgiveness by gratifying the invalid's whim, so, with the forty sous left of the amount she had obtained at the Mont de Piété still in her pocket, she hastened to a rôtisseur's, and purchased a quarter of a chicken there, thence to a bakery, where she bought a couple of crisp white rolls, after which she turned her steps homeward.
A handsome coupé was standing at the door of the house in which Mariette lived, though she did not even notice this fact, but when she stopped at the porter's room as usual, to ask for her key, Madame Justin exclaimed:
"Your key, Mlle. Mariette? Why, that gentleman called for it a moment ago."
"What gentleman?"
"A decorated gentleman. Yes, I should say he was decorated. Why, the ribbon in his buttonhole was at least two inches wide. I never saw a person with such a big decoration."
"But I am not acquainted with any decorated gentleman," replied the young girl, much surprised. "He must have made a mistake."
"Oh, no, child. He asked me if the Widow Lacombe didn't live here with her goddaughter, a seamstress, so you see there could be no mistake."
"But didn't you tell the gentleman that my godmother was an invalid and could not see any one?"
"Yes, child, but he said he must have a talk with her on a very important matter, all the same, so I gave him the key, and let him go up."
"I will go and see who it is, Madame Justin," responded Mariette.
Imagine her astonishment, when, on reaching the fifth floor, she saw the stranger through the half-open door, and heard him address these words to Madame Lacombe:
"As your goddaughter has gone out, my good woman, I can state my business with you very plainly."
When these words reached her ears, Mariette, yielding to a very natural feeling of curiosity, concluded to remain on the landing and listen to the conversation, instead of entering the room.
CHAPTER IV.
THE VOICE OF THE TEMPTER
The speaker was a man about forty-five years of age, with regular though rather haggard features and a long moustache, made as black and lustrous by some cosmetic as his artistically curled locks, which evidently owed their raven hue to artificial means. The stranger's physiognomy impressed one as being a peculiar combination of deceitfulness, cunning, and impertinence. He had large feet and remarkably large hands; in short, despite his very evident pretensions, it was easy to see that he was one of those vulgar persons who cannot imitate, but only parody real elegance. Dressed in execrable taste, with a broad red ribbon in the buttonhole of his frock coat, he affected a military bearing. With his hat still on his head, he had seated himself a short distance from the bed, and as he talked with the invalid he gnawed the jewelled handle of a small cane that he carried.
Madame Lacombe was gazing at the stranger with mingled surprise and distrust. She was conscious, too, of a strong aversion, caused, doubtless, by his both insolent and patronising air.
"As your goddaughter is out, my good woman, I can state my business with you very plainly."
These were the words that Mariette overheard on reaching the landing. The conversation that ensued was, in substance, as follows:
"You asked, monsieur, if I were the Widow Lacombe, Mariette Moreau's godmother," said the sick woman tartly. "I told you that I was. Now, what do you want with me? Explain, if you please."
"In the first place, my good woman — "
"My name is Lacombe, Madame Lacombe."
"Oh, very well, Madame Lacombe," said the stranger, with an air of mock deference, "I will tell you first who I am; afterwards I will tell you what I want. I am Commandant de la Miraudière." Then, touching his red ribbon, he added, "An old soldier as you see — ten campaigns — five wounds."
"That is nothing to me."
"I have many influential acquaintances in Paris, dukes, counts, and marquises."
"What do I care about that?"
"I keep a carriage, and spend at least twenty thousand francs a year."
"While my goddaughter and I starve on twenty sous a day, when she can earn them," said the sick woman, bitterly. "That is the way of the world, however."
"But it is not fair, my good Mother Lacombe," responded Commandant de la Miraudière, "it is not fair, and I have come here to put an end to such injustice."
"If you've come here to mock me, I wish you'd take yourself off," retorted the sick woman, sullenly.
"Mock you, Mother Lacombe, mock you! Just hear what I have come to offer you. A comfortable room in a nice apartment, a servant to wait on you, two good meals a day, coffee every morning, and fifty francs a month for your snuff, if you take it, or for anything else you choose to fancy, if you don't, — well, what do you say to all this, Mother Lacombe?"
"I say — I say you're only making sport of me, that is, unless there is something behind all this. When one offers such things to a poor old cripple like me, it is not for the love of God, that is certain."
"No, Mother Lacombe, but for the love of two beautiful eyes, perhaps."
"Whose beautiful eyes?"
"Your goddaughter's, Mother Lacombe," replied Commandant de la Miraudière, cynically. "There is no use beating about the bush."
The invalid made a movement indicative of surprise, then, casting a searching look at the stranger, inquired:
"You know Mariette, then?"
"I have been to Madame Jourdan's several times to order linen, for I am very particular about my linen," added the stranger, glancing down complacently at his embroidered shirt-front. "I have consequently often seen your goddaughter there; I think her charming, adorable, and — "
"And you have come to buy her of me?"
"Bravo, Mother Lacombe! You are a clever and sensible woman, I see. You understand things in the twinkling of an eye. This is the proposition I have come to make to you: A nice suite of rooms, newly furnished for Mariette, with whom you are to live, five hundred francs a month to run the establishment, a maid and a cook who will also wait on you, a suitable outfit for Mariette, and a purse of fifty louis to start with, to say nothing of the other presents she will get if she behaves properly. So much for the substantials. As for the agreeable part, there will be drives in the park, boxes at the theatre, — I know any number of actors, and I am also on the best of terms with some very high-toned ladies who give many balls and card-parties, — in short, your goddaughter will have a delightful, an enchanted life, Mother Lacombe, the life of a duchess. Well, how does all this strike you?"
"Very favourably, of course," responded the sick woman, with a sardonic smile. "Such cattle as we are, are only fit to be sold when we are young, or to sell others when we are old."
"Ah, well, Mother Lacombe, to quiet your scruples, if you have any, you shall have sixty francs a month for your snuff, and I shall also make you a present of a handsome shawl, so you can go around respectably with Mariette, whom you are never to leave for a moment, understand, for I am as jealous as a tiger, and have no intention of being made a fool of."
"All this tallies exactly with what I said to Mariette only this morning. 'You are an honest girl,' I said to her, 'and yet you can scarcely earn twenty sous a day making three hundred franc chemises for a kept woman.'"
"Three hundred franc chemises ordered from Madame Jourdan's? Oh, yes, Mother Lacombe, I know. They are for Amandine, who is kept by the Marquis de Saint-Herem, an intimate friend of mine. It was I who induced her to patronise Madame Jourdan, — a regular bonanza for her, though the marquis is very poor pay, but he makes all his furnishers as well as all his mistresses the fashion. This little Amandine was a clerk in a little perfumery shop on the Rue Colbert six months ago, and Saint-Herem has made her the rage. There is no woman in Paris half as much talked about as Amandine. The same thing may happen to Mariette some day, Mother Lacombe. She may be wearing three hundred franc chemises instead of making them. Don't it make you proud to think of it?"
"Unless Mariette has the same fate as another poor girl I knew."
"What happened to her, Mother Lacombe?"
"She was robbed."
"Robbed?"
"She, too, was promised mountains of gold. The man who promised it placed her in furnished apartments, and at the end of three months left her without a penny. Then she killed herself in despair."
"Really, Mother Lacombe, what kind of a man do you take me for?" demanded the stranger, indignantly. "Do I look like a scoundrel, like a Robert Macaire?"
"I don't know, I am sure."
"I, an old soldier who have fought in twenty campaigns, and have ten wounds! I, who am hand and glove with all the lions of Paris! I, who keep my carriage and spend twenty thousand francs a year! Speak out, what security do you want? If you say so, the apartment shall be furnished within a week, the lease made out in your name, and the rent paid one year in advance; besides, you shall have the twenty-five or thirty louis I have about me to bind the bargain, if you like."
And as he spoke, he drew a handful of gold from his pocket and threw it on the little table by the sick woman's bed, adding: "You see I am not like you. I am not afraid of being robbed, Mother Lacombe."
On hearing the chink of coin, the invalid leaned forward, and cast a greedy, covetous look upon the glittering pile. Never in her life had she had a gold coin in her possession, and now she could not resist the temptation to touch the gleaming metal, and let it slip slowly through her fingers.
"I can at least say that I have handled gold once in my life," the sick woman murmured, hoarsely.
"It is nothing to handle it, Mother Lacombe. Think of the pleasure of spending it."
"There is enough here to keep one in comfort five or six months," said the old woman, carefully arranging the gold in little piles.
"And remember that you and Mariette can have as much every month if you like, Mother Lacombe, in good, shining gold, if you wish it."
After a long silence, the sick woman raised her hollow eyes to the stranger's face, and said:
"You think Mariette pretty, monsieur. You are right, and there is not a better-hearted, more deserving girl in the world. Well, be generous to her. This money is a mere trifle to a man as rich as you are. Make us a present of it."
"Eh?" exclaimed the stranger, in profound astonishment.
"Monsieur," said the consumptive, clasping her hands imploringly, "be generous, be charitable. This sum of money is a mere trifle to you, as I said before, but it would support us for months. We should be able to pay all we owe. Mariette would not be obliged to work night and day. She would have time to look around a little, and find employment that paid her better. We should owe five or six months of peace and happiness to your bounty. It costs us so little to live! Do this, kind sir, and we will for ever bless you, and for once in my life I shall have known what happiness is."
The sick woman's tone was so sincere, her request so artless, that the stranger, who could not conceive of any human creature being stupid enough really to expect such a thing of a man of his stamp, felt even more hurt than surprised, and said to himself:
"Really, this is not very flattering to me. The old hag must take me for a country greenhorn to make such a proposition as that."
So bursting into a hearty laugh, he said, aloud:
"You must take me for a philanthropist, or the winner of the Montyon prize, Mother Lacombe. I am to make you a present of six hundred francs, and accept your benediction and eternal gratitude in return, eh?"
The sick woman had yielded to one of those wild and sudden hopes that sometimes seize the most despondent persons; but irritated by the contempt with which her proposal had been received, she now retorted, with a sneer:
"I hope you will forgive me for having so grossly insulted you, I am sure, monsieur."
"Oh, you needn't apologise, Mother Lacombe. I have taken no offence, as you see. But we may as well settle this little matter without any further delay. Am I to pocket those shining coins you seem to take so much pleasure in handling, yes or no?"
And he stretched out his hand as if to gather up the gold pieces.
With an almost unconscious movement, the sick woman pushed his hand away, exclaiming, sullenly:
"Wait a minute, can't you? You needn't be afraid that anybody is going to eat your gold."
"On the contrary, that is exactly what I would like you to do, on condition, of course — "
"But I know Mariette, and she would never consent," replied the sick woman, with her eyes still fixed longingly upon the shining coins.
"Nonsense!"
"But she is an honest girl, I tell you. She might listen to a man she loved, as so many girls do, but to you, never. She would absolutely refuse. She has her ideas — oh, you needn't laugh."
"Oh, I know Mariette is a virtuous girl. Madame Jourdan, for whom your goddaughter has worked for years, has assured me of that fact; but I know, too, that you have a great deal of influence over her. She is dreadfully afraid of you, Madame Jourdan says, so I am sure that you can, if you choose, persuade or, if need be, compel Mariette to accept — what? Simply an unlooked-for piece of good fortune, for you are housed like beggars and almost starving, that is evident. Suppose you refuse, what will be the result? The girl, with all her fine disinterestedness, will be fooled sooner or later by some scamp in her own station in life, and — "
"That is possible, but she will not have sold herself."
"That is all bosh, as you'll discover some day when her lover deserts her, and she has to do what so many other girls do to save herself from starving."
"That is very possible," groaned the sick woman. "Hunger is an evil counsellor, I know, when one has one's child as well as one's self to think of. And with this gold, how many of these poor girls might be saved! Ah! if Mariette is to end her days like them, after all, what is the use of struggling?"
For a minute or two the poor woman's contracted features showed that a terrible conflict was raging in her breast. The gold seemed to exercise an almost irresistible fascination over her; she seemed unable to remove her eyes from it; but at last with a desperate effort she closed them, as if to shut out the sight of the money, and throwing herself back on her pillow, cried, angrily:
"Go away, go away, and let me alone."
"What! you refuse my offer, Mother Lacombe?"
"Yes."
"Positively?"
"Yes."
"Then I've got to pocket all this gold again, I suppose," said the stranger, gathering up the coins, and making them jingle loudly as he did so. "All these shining yellow boys must go back into my pocket."
"May the devil take you and your gold!" exclaimed the now thoroughly exasperated woman. "Keep your money, but clear out. I didn't take Mariette in to ruin her, or advise her to ruin herself. Rather than eat bread earned in such way, I would light a brazier of charcoal and end both the girl's life and my own."
Madame Lacombe had scarcely uttered these words before Mariette burst into the room, pale and indignant, and throwing herself upon the sick woman's neck, exclaimed:
"Ah, godmother. I knew very well that you loved me as if I were your own child!"
Then turning to Commandant de la Miraudière, whom she recognised as the man who had stared at her so persistently at Madame Jourdan's, she said contemptuously:
"I beg that you will leave at once."
"But, my dear little dove — "
"I was there at the door, monsieur, and I heard all."
"So much the better. You know what I am willing to do, and I assure you — "
"Once more, I must request you to leave at once."
"Very well, very well, my little Lucrece, I will go, but I shall allow you one week for reflection," said the stranger, preparing to leave the room.
But on the threshold he paused and added:
"You will not forget my name, Commandant de la Miraudière, my dear. Madame Jourdan knows my address."
After which he disappeared.
"Ah, godmother," exclaimed the girl, returning to the invalid, and embracing her effusively, "how nobly you defended me!"
"Yes," responded the sick woman, curtly, freeing herself almost roughly from her goddaughter's embrace, "and yet with all these virtues, one perishes of hunger."
"But, godmother — "
"Don't talk any more about it, for heaven's sake!" cried the invalid, angrily. "It is all settled. What is the use of discussing it any further? I have done my duty; you have done yours. I am an honest woman; you are an honest girl. Great good it will do you, and me, too; you may rest assured of that."
"But, godmother, listen to me — "
"We shall be found here some fine morning stiff and cold, you and I, with a pan of charcoal between us. Ah, ha, ha!"
And with a shrill, mirthless laugh, the poor creature, embittered by years of misfortune, and chafing against the scruples that had kept her honest in spite of herself, put an end to the conversation by abruptly turning her back upon her goddaughter.
It was nearly night now.
Mariette went out into the hall where she had left the basket containing the sick woman's supper. She placed the food on a small table near the bed, and then went and seated herself silently by the narrow window, where, drawing the fragments of her lover's letter from her pocket, she gazed at them with despair in her soul.
On leaving Mariette, the commandant said to himself:
"I'm pretty sure that last shot told in spite of what they said. The girl will change her mind and so will the old woman. The sight of my gold seemed to dazzle the eyes of that old hag as much as if she had been trying to gaze at the noonday sun. Their poverty will prove a much more eloquent advocate for me than any words of mine. I do not despair, by any means. Two months of good living will make Mariette one of the prettiest girls in Paris, and she will do me great credit at very little expense. But now I must turn my attention to business. A fine little discovery it is that I have just made, and I think I shall be able to turn it to very good account."
Stepping into his carriage, he was driven to the Rue Grenelle St. Honoré. Alighting in front of No. 17, a very unpretentious dwelling, he said to the porter:
"Does M. Richard live here?"
"A father and son of that name both live here, monsieur."
"I wish to see the son. Is M. Louis Richard in?"
"Yes, monsieur. He has only just returned from a journey. He is with his father now."
"Ah, he is with his father? Well, I would like to see him alone."
"As they both occupy the same room, there will be some difficulty about that."
The commandant reflected a moment, then, taking a visiting card bearing his address from his pocket, he added these words in pencil: "requests the honour of a visit from M. Louis Richard to-morrow morning between nine and ten, as he has a very important communication which will brook no delay, to make to him."
"Here are forty sous for you, my friend," said M. de la Miraudière to the porter, "and I want you to give this card to M. Louis Richard."
"That is a very easy way to earn forty sous."
"But you are not to give the card to him until to-morrow morning as he goes out, and his father is not to know anything about it. Do you understand?"
"Perfectly, monsieur, and there will be no difficulty about it as M. Louis goes out every morning at seven o'clock, while his father never leaves before nine."
"I can rely upon you, then?"
"Oh, yes, monsieur, you can regard the errand as done."
Commandant de la Miraudière reëntered his carriage and drove away.
Soon after his departure a postman brought a letter for Louis Richard. It was the letter written that same morning in Mariette's presence by the scrivener, who had addressed it to No. 17 Rue de Grenelle, Paris, instead of to Dreux as the young girl had requested.
We will now usher the reader into the room occupied by the scrivener, Richard, and his son, who had just returned from Dreux.